Shopping made easy with Paywise

“My original plan was to create a crowd funding platform since many entrepreneurs, myself included, needed a payment option. But this was only available from a local bank via a credit card payment option in TT dollars which was very expensive,” Alleyne said.

After attending a Start-up Weekend in 2013 (an event designed to assist entrepreneurs turn their business ideas into reality), he discovered that there were many young entrepreneurs with brilliant ideas, but no payment system to monetise those ideas.

“This was the further impetus to create a payment system. I needed it and there were a community of entrepreneurs trying to do online business as well, but lacking a payment mechanism,” Alleyne reveals.

He says that credit card penetration was really low in TT (approximately 20 percent as at 2015) which meant that even though there was a credit card payment system, business owners could not target the entire population. The initial proposal he made to the bank was refused, since the bank did not allow a business to use a credit card payment option which he proposed.

Alleyne then created a prototype, a very rudimentary website and customers made payments at the banks.

He solicited feedback from his initial customers which was very informative and useful. “Customers revealed that they did not want to go into the banks to make payments, so I did some more research and tweaked the first model. In 2014, Paywise was redesigned and relaunched using a network of agents,” Alleyne says.

However, there was limited reach within the agent network, since extending outside of the East-West corridor proved challenging. So in 2015, the business model was changed again and now payments can be made through NLCB via the bill payment system at over 900 locations in TT , allowing people with cash to make payments in a simple and convenient way.

“Customers are familiar with interacting with this system to purchase phone credit, pay bills and play Lotto, so it makes things easy,” Alleyne says.

One of the primary benefits from using Paywise is that the system targets a wider market where virtually anyone with cash in their pockets can assess it. The cost to the merchant is $5 per transaction and there is no set up fee, monthly cost or minimum payment. It is safer and saves entrepreneurs lots of time and fuel that would have been spent driving around to collect cash.

It also alleviates lost sales from customers who dislike lining up at the bank. Businesses that use Paywise include debt collection agencies, cosmetics, lending agencies, fitness/training and others.

Payment methods are manual, automated and integrated.
For the manual method the customer makes a payment and sends a snapshot of the receipt to the merchant via WhatsApp or email. This method is recommended for businesses that do not have an online presence.

The automated option allows customers to make payments using their unique numbers (or order numbers) for each transaction and the Paywise system automatically identifies the customers, alleviating the need for a copy of the receipt to be sent to the merchants as they can log into their Paywise account to track payments. This method is suitable for any merchant with a web presence or Facebook page, so merchants can assign a payment number when the customer identifies a product they want.

The integrated method requires the customer to use a unique number (or order number) and the Paywise system automatically posts a message to the merchant’s website. This method works for merchants who have an e-commerce presence with shopping carts. The major difference between the automated and integrated approach is that the integrated method alerts merchants so they can begin fulfilling the order once the payment is made on the website.

The agent needs to know three things to process payment: Who is the customer paying? Paywise; What account number? –a unique number assigned by merchant’ and finally, the Payment amount.

Paywise has to conform to TT ’s anti- money laundering laws which are regulated by the Financial Intelligence Unit (FIU) and the Central Bank.
In order to register with Paywise, the business must be registered with the Ministry of Legal Affairs and must have a bank account in its name.

Customers indicate that it is a Paywise payment and provide the account number, or their unique number which is created by the merchant. Paywise then identifies the number with the merchant and credits the account. Bank accounts are credited every Tuesday and Friday via an automatic funds transfer system and appears within 15 minutes to an hour, depending on the bank. The merchant is automatically notified via text message and email whenever a payment is made.

One may ask why would someone venture into this type of business. Alleyne has a background in finance and IT and switched careers several times. After secondary school, he pursued computer programming at the San Fernando Technical Institute and then worked in IT for nine years at Royal Bank.

After completing his MBA, he switched from IT to finance and returned to banking where he worked in all areas of lending/credit – personal banking, commercial, corporate, investment.
“As a former business analyst in the IT area, part of my function included talking to users and translating their needs into an IT solution. My background in finance gave me a better appreciation of business and how it operates, he said. “Although I loved the area of IT, one thing that remained with me was the ability to look at a business situation and see an IT solution for it. Paywise allows me to use all of my skills to solve customers’ needs.”
For more info: www.paywise.com, ian.alleyne@paywise.co www.carolyncorreia.com